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American State 


Introductory. 

There is to-day, without doubt, a far greater portion 
of the people of the United States who have lost faith 
in republican institutions than at any period since the 
adoption of the Constitution, It would seem almost 
as if the victory of nationality in the late civil war was 
purchased with death, as heroes have fallen in the 
moment of victory. What we gained in that struggle 
is manifest and has been echoed and re-echoed from 
press and hustings till it is familiar as a nursery-rhyme; 
what we lost is beginning to make itself felt till con¬ 
cealment is no longer rational or possible. That some¬ 
thing very essential to the working of free institutions 
has fled from us is evident; and the reasonable thing 
to be done would seem to be to find out what it is and 
replace it if it can be replaced. It is not necessary to 
repeat here what nearly every newspaper in the land 
without distinction of party is bewailing; that con- 





2 


cfhe American State. 


science appears to be banished from the public service,, 
that the administration of government is devoted to a 
large extent to personal objects, that responsibility in 
office is turned into a mockery. But what is most ap¬ 
palling is the extent of this corruption. Were it nestled 
only in high places at the national capital, its distance- 
from the reach of the people might be its excuse, but 
its slimy folds have enveloped state, county, township 
and even the school district, the very humblest of 
governmental organizations. 

It is not our purpose to indulge in a lengthy Jere¬ 
miad concerning this shocking decay of public morality, 
and still less to expectorate sentimental slaver about the 
poor injured people. The people are to blame, they 
choose their rulers, to them belongs the responsibility 
of the choice. The greatest freedom implies the 
greatest responsibility. Let the latter decay, the free¬ 
dom decays in proportion. The first condition of re¬ 
turning health, is that the people recognize their 
responsibility, and then they may expect it of their 
officers. If they are unfit to choose their rulers, then 
somebody must do it for them, and somebody will do 
it for them. It now looks not unfrequently as if some¬ 
body were doing it for them already. The present 
mode of conducting elections comes very near taking 
the matter out of their hands. It need not be added 
that such an infringement if not resented is tantamount 
to a confession of incompentency to choose their rulers 
and a surrender of their right. The form may be 
there, the polls may be opened, but everybody knows 
that the election has been settled beforehand. 

The presupposition of the American State is the 
American citizen. There must be, lying at the basis of 



The American State, 


3 


all institutions, a national consciousness which wells up 
and gives them life. The fundamental principle of his 
nation must be the deepest source of action in every 
citizen; to it everything else must be subordinated. 
There is no use of talking about a free State without 
free men, that is those who have realized in their whole 
thought and being the idea of freedom. External en¬ 
franchisement can not make freemen, namely, can not; 
free the consciousness. 

^Tis not the outward bond that makes the slave, 

But the base narrow thought wtthin the man. 

It is just this national principle which has become 
obscured by the one-sidedness of the civil war and 
threatens to become wholly extinct. Now is the time 
if ever for it to be recalled to the mind of the American 
citizen. Hitherto he possessed it instinctively. Bat 
since the contradiction which assails it has risen in his 
mind, he must solve that contradiction consciously . He 
can no longer trust his instincts, they have been led 
astray too far, and besides are never very reliable. He 
can only return to the national principle through,* 
thought, he must be conscious of and comprehend the: 
rational basis of his government. 

All our troubles come from the loss of the true idea 
of free government in the minds of the people, in 
other words, from the destruction of the deepest: 
national thought. With it must go in time the realized! 
institutions of the country, for these are vitalized only 
through the individual consciousness. The instinct of 
the American nation was its most wonderful attribute*, 
it was always true to its highest thought, though it 
could never give a rational account of its processes. 
Nor is this to be said merely of the common citizen, 






4 


The American State. 


but in an equal degree of the statesman. In action he 
was always true to the national principle in the pro- 
foundest degree, but when it came to statement he 
employed arguments which would destroy at once the 
entire system of government, if adhered to, and which 
were quite the opposite of his action. In American 
political literature there is not to be found any adequate 
enunciation and deduction of the American State. 
Hitherto this perhaps was not so necessary. But at 
present the only possibility of recovering our principle 
is by thinking it, by comprehending its logical basis, 
and all its relations. 

To aid in the performance of this work there are two 
classes of persons to whom, by their occupation, people 
are inclined to look: the politician and the lawyer. 
But the politician, even when honest, has never risen 
above the assertion of the individual,—such is the chief 
content of American political literature from the Dec¬ 
laration of Rights to the present. Hence, as it is but 
one step from principle to action, it is but one step 
from the absolute assertion of selfishness to dishon¬ 
esty. It is a harsh and paradoxical statement, but true 
in its literal sense that, as a general rule, the only dif¬ 
ference between the honest and dishonest politician lies 
not in their convictions but in their conduct, and that 
the dishonest one carries out his belief to its logical 
result, while the honest one does not. For the indi¬ 
vidual is the principle, hence, when there is any conflict 
between it and the public service, the latter must be 
subordinate. Corruption in office hence results, and 
there is nothing to stem it, because there is no national 
conviction for the basis of reform. Many men, it is 
true, of deep moral instincts, hate and denounce this 



The American State. 


5 


corruption, but their very premises may often betaken 
by the rogue to justify his rascality. 

It is utterly idle therefore, to expect any reform with¬ 
out a radical change in the public consciousness, for all 
abuses have sprung from that consciousness. There 
must be a new birth, a new national spirit which will 
combine the true principles of the old regime with the 
valid results of the new. The latter have absorbed 
our attention long enough; it is time to stop the revo¬ 
lution unless it become chronic. The great question is, 
how ? Mere exhortations to morality and honesty can 
effect nothing; even the rogue unites with the moralizer 
and says, “Be honest; ” indeed, he seems to be the loud¬ 
est moralizer. No, the seat of the disease must be 
reached, the conviction must be changed; when a man 
is held by that, there is no necessity of sermonizing. 
As long as the nation holds its present conviction, 
things can only get worse. 

It may therefore be expected that little assistance can 
be obtained from the politician, inasmuch as he rather 
represents than forms the consciousness of the people. 

The second of these classes above referred to, the 
lawyer, has shown himself equally incapable of stem¬ 
ming the tide of corruption, or even placing upon it 
any legal limits. Nor from the nature of his calling 
could anything different have been expected. There is 
one fundamental principle upon which the legal con¬ 
sciousness rests: that is precedent. “Ask me not what 
ought to be but what has been,” said an eminent advo¬ 
cate. The lawyer’s pursuit is chiefly to refer the pres¬ 
ent back to something in the past, and to point out its 
similarity or dissimilarity ; if it is like the same, then it 
is law, it is right, it is just, if not, the contrary. Hence, 



6 


The American State , 


the intense conservatism of the legal profession, and 
hence, we may add, its immense importance to the sta¬ 
bility of society. But this conservatism, this adher¬ 
ence to what is old, is also the finite side of the law¬ 
yer, and makes him utterly helpless in periods of trans¬ 
ition and civil commotion. His whole thought and 
occupation are concerned with the identity of the present 
with the past; justice and law reign when the two agree. 
But mankind do progress, there is such a thing as 
change and it must be recognized by the laws and 
institutions of a country, though by revolution. 

It is at this point that the legal consciousness breaks 
with itself and turns upon and destroys itself. For it 
sees that change too is a valid thing in the world, that 
its fundamental category, precedent, breaks down, for 
the present is quite different from everything which has 
gone before, hence the lawyer now takes change as his 
precedent instead of identitv. Thus the legal con¬ 
sciousness turns from being the most conservative to- 
the most revolutionary. Will any one deny that the 
best legal talent South and North led or followed the 
extremists ? Has not the Supreme Court, theoreticallv 
composed of the best talent of the profession, assailed 
the very existence of law by the logical annihilation of 
property in the Legal Tender decision ? Nay, in that 
same decision, has it not destroyed precedent it¬ 
self by reversing one year what it had decided the pre¬ 
vious year ? What was law yesterday is not law to-day* 
but may be to-morrow. Nor is it necessary to revert 
to the legislative branch of government, the lawyers 
were the leaders. Another historical instance is the 
French Revolution. Says Burke : cf As soon as I saw 



r l he American State . 


7 


the number ot lawyers in the National Assembly, I knew' 
all that would follow.” 

We hope this will not be considered a vulgar tirade 
against the legal profession. It is in the very nature of 
things that every profession has its limits, an exclusive 
study and devotion to it must cramp the mind within 
these limits and render it unfit for a just comprehension 
of the total interests of society. Nor are the above re¬ 
marks true of every individual law'yer; many there 
have been who were as wise legislators, as great philoso¬ 
phers, as they were good lawyers. We are only speak¬ 
ing of the general consciousness of the profession, the 
necessary results of its pursuit upon mind taken in the 
average. 

Reformation therefore cannot be expected from the- 
politician for he represents the existing consciousness 
which is the very evil complained of. Only when this 
is changed will the politician change. Nor can the 
lawyer help the nation out of the difficulty, for unfor¬ 
tunately his fundamental category, precedent, can fur¬ 
nish only confusion, contradiction, revolution ; prece¬ 
dent is now on the wrong side. Perhaps some one may 
think of the minister in this emergency. But the truth 
is, he is more to blame than anybody else for the 
present state of public conscience, it is the legitimate 
fruit of his teaching. For it was he who transformed 
the opposition to law into obedience to the Higher 
Law, this Higher Law being ultimately individual 
opinion. Thus the whole realm of the Established, 
institutions, constitutions, laws, the State itself were 
subordinated to the individual, and every person became 
a “law unto himself.” Therefore the national con¬ 
sciousness began to decay, for that must have the nation 



s 


The American State . 


as its object; but the point is, that there is no longer 
any faith in the nation and national institutions, but 
only in self. The villain can ask nothing better than 
to be a law unto himself, and when the public convic¬ 
tion is fundamentally the same, how can he be reached ? 
And if the best and most moral men of the commu¬ 
nity believe in and preach such doctrines, what can be 
expected of the worst? Just what has followed and 
nothing else. It is but fair however to say that many 
individual clergymen and even whole denominations 
form striking exceptions to the above statements. But 
it must remain one of the curious facts of history that 
the very hey-day of rascality and corruption had its 
origin in a so-called moral revolution. 

There are two capital epochs in the history of 
American politics. The first begins with the adoption 
of the Constitution, the era of the feeling of national¬ 
ity. There was an immediate, unconscious unity of the 
individual citizen with his government. At its men¬ 
tion his bosom swelled with national pride, he knew it 
was the best government under the sun, it corresponded 
in every respect with his wants, feelings, and hopes, it 
was an adequate reflection of his consciousness. This 
was the period of national childhood when there was 
the simple ethical faith which questions not, but is in 
the deepest harmony with truth. No doubt exceptions 
could be found, but they were comparatively few. All 
political parties reposed upon this national basis, here 
was the point in which they all united, whatever other 
differences they may have had. 

Now the characteristic to be emphasized is that this 
harmony of the individual with the government was 
unconscious, resting in the emotions and not brought 



The American State. 


9 


about through thought. Nor was there any necessity; 
the citizen felt his country in himself, and himself in his 
country. It is true there were political writings of 
theorists and practical, statesmen, belonging to this pe¬ 
riod. To say that they solved the problem of govern¬ 
ment for thought, would be the greatest mistake ; they 
did not do so for a very manifest reason: there was no 
problem yet to solve, the contradiction between the in¬ 
dividual consciousness and authority had not yet risen 
in the national mind. 

But it was rising and growing, and great was the em¬ 
barrassment and consternation of the old school of 
statesmen. They sought to stem it by make-shifts, by 
compromises, even by tearful exhortations ; in vain, 
the good old times were gone never to return. This is 
not the place or the time to write the history of that 
great change and its causes: for if such history were 
written it could give little satisfaction to any party 
at present, for it would have to be impartial. Suffice 
it to say that it was mainly the slavery question which 
aroused this sleeping contradiction. Slavery had 
strongly intrenched itself in the law and government; 
men who opposed slavery began to oppose law and 
government. On the other hand men who defended 
slavery declared they would defend it to the annihi¬ 
lation of law and government. These opinions in a 
special subject necessarily became general dogmas. 
Hence the resistance to the Fugitive Slave Law was 
soon generalized into the right of resistance to all law 
which did not meet the approbation of the individual 
conscience. On the other hand the legitimate repeal 
of that law was declared to involve the right of the 
dissolution of the Union. The point to be specially 




IO 


The American State. 


noted is that on both sides the individual has fallen 
out with the government, the unity of the first epoch 
has perished, the citizen has placed himself over against 
the State, and announces its subordination to himself. 
For a long period of years the people of both sections 
were in the process of education by their writers, 
speakers, newspapers, till at last their consciousness 
.became completely imbued with the above mentioned 
doctrine. Both sections were quite at the striking 
point, both were quite ready to assail their government, 
for that has been their education for a quarter of a cen¬ 
tury. There was however a large body of people, the 
great majority in the so-called Border States located 
between the extreme sections, who still cherished the 
feelings of nationality of the olden time, who were well 
satisfied with their country, in whose consciousness this 
break had not taken place to any extent, who therefore 
would smite to earth any hand that was raised against 
their government, whether from the North or from the 
South. But that a collision could be avoided was sim¬ 
ply impossible. The only question was which side 
would first begin, for against it would be arrayed also 
the Border States. John Brown from the North made 
the first attempt. But it was too soon, hence he re¬ 
ceived only “ moral support ” and no real assistance 
from his allies. Then the South began, here was an 
open, general, systematic rebellion. The South thus 
made herself the aggressor, the Border States threw 
themselves into the scale against her and decided the 
conflict. This was not done from any sympathy with 
Northern principles,Jor from sharing in the Northern 
consciousness ; these were even more hated tfc^an the 



The American State. 


11 


Southern; the North would have been assailed with 
equal readiness if it had been the aggressor. 

It would have made little difference which side came 
into power ; the government was bound to be revolu¬ 
tionized, for the break in the national consciousness 
had become universal—was in both parties. It can be 
of no use to assail or defend, to lament or glorify this 
state of affairs ; the duty of the time is to recognize it 
and its consequences. The nation had come to an epoch 
of development, there was a chasm to be passed, a val¬ 
ley of fire, of negation ; the great question is now to 
pass it and leave it behind, and not to be burning forever 
in Hell-fire, to be always purifying and never purified, 
like France, like Mexico and South America, like the 
Latin consciousness generally. 

The third epoch of American political life, the true 
period of robust manhood will begin when the people 
have a clear perception of this contradiction and over¬ 
come it. Such a conquest can only be accomplished by 
thought. They must think, comprehend their own 
national principle, from which they have fallen away. 
This will be the true return, like that of the prodigal, 
the stronger for having passed through the contra¬ 
diction. There will be restored the harmony of the 
first epoch, together with the great and eternal result of 
our struggle—national self-consciousness. For instead 
of the immediate unity between the individual and 
government, there arises the higher unity mediated by 
thought, based not upon the transitory element of feel¬ 
ing, but upon an everlasting foundation, the self- 
conscious reason of the nation. 

To study and elaborate this national principle and to 



I 2 


\The American State . 


bring it to the minds of the people are the duties of 
the hour, which is the only excuse for writing the 
series of essays which are to follow. 


NO. 2 -THE STATE IN GENERAL. 

Before attempting to ascertain the nature of the 
American State in particular, it is absolutely necessary 
to know what the State is in general. Nor can the 
manifold functions of the State be comprehended with¬ 
out such preparatory knowledge. This, then, must be 
our starting-point: to find an adequate definition of 
the State, from which all its determinations can be logi¬ 
cally derived. Such a definition, in order to be truly 
adequate, must not include too much nor too little, 
since it can become of great practical importance. For 
if men proceed upon a conception of the State that 
includes too much, then the State is directed to pur¬ 
poses which are wholly alien to its end, and which ulti¬ 
mately must be subversive of its existence. If, on the 
contrary, men proceed upon a conception of the State 
that includes too little, it does not answer the end ot 
its creation, and like everything in the same category, 
must pass away. The political elements of the coun¬ 
try have always swayed between these two extremes. 
The one party has sought to make the State perform 
quite all of the important and some even of the menial 
functions of civil society; the other party has main¬ 
tained principles which would deny to the State the pri¬ 
mordial right of all existence, namely, the right of self- 
preservation. It is hence of the first importance to 
determine precisely the thought of the State, since from 
this thought all its functions and limitations must be 
deduced. 



The American State. 


l 3 

But such a discussion will he necessarily somewhat 
abstruse. The thought of the State is of the most con¬ 
crete and proportionately difficult of comprehension. 
It is necessary to grasp not merely an abstraction, or 
some phase of the State’s activity, but that activity in 
its totality, in its eternal process. There is no way of 
getting rid of the labor of thinking here, nor any 
means of making the subject entertaining. There never 
yet has been discovered and probably never will be dis¬ 
covered any means by which thought can be compre¬ 
hended without thinking. But the fruits of such an 
effort will amply repay the severe labor of acquirement. 
In fact, it is worse than useless to proceed without this 
primal foundation. 

First of all, then, a basis must be found for the State. 
Let us make our beginning with the simplest observa¬ 
tion which is possible concerning it, namel), that it is a 
work standing in the world before us. It is not a phy¬ 
sical product in the sense that a stone or tree is, but is 
created by Spirit or Mind as distinct from Nature. 
Those who maintain that mind is only the higher part 
of Nature would also probably hold that the State is a 
product of this higher part, and thus substantially 
agree with the mentioned proposition. But observe 
that it is called a work, a product, and hence can only 
have been produced by Will, for this is the name of 
that form or phase of Spirit which produces, or to use 
the technical word for this mental operation, which 
objectifies. A work is something real, the Will is that 
which makes real, realizes. Thus we have at least one 
of the essential elements and the great starting-point of 
the State:—Will. 

But the Will in order to produce a work must have 



14 


The American State. 


some end or purpose which it puts into that work; in 
other words, the Will must have a content. Hence, the 
next question which arises is, what is the content of 
the Will, which content when realized is that work called 
the State? Or, to shorten the expression, what does 
the Will will in order to bring forth the State ? This 
is the question upon which the whole argument turns, 
and when an adequate answer shall be given to it, there 
will be seen a formula expressive of the complete 
thought of the State. For it is manifest that the Will 
has many other contents, and produces many other 
works besides the State, from which the latter must be 
carefully distinguished. Hence arises the necessity of 
examining and systematizing these contents. 

Now the fundamental characteristic of the Will is to 
carry out and place in the world, to realize what has 
been conceived or felt by the mind. Its power con¬ 
sists in objectifying—to resort again to the technical ex¬ 
pression—that which lies in the subject. It is what 
creates the world anew, so, to speak, and stamps upon 
the same its own impress. But there is a vast differ¬ 
ence between that which wills, and that which is willed; 
the latter we shall always be careful to call the content 
of the Will, and the former simply Will. Nor can it be 
superfluous again to remind the reader, that Will means 
activity and its product is always a reality ; for Will 
unrealized is not truly Will, but a feeling, wish, concep¬ 
tion or end; it lacks just the essential element. The 
consideration of the various forms of what is some¬ 
times called subjective Will, can therefore be here omit¬ 
ted, for with us the Will is not at all, unless as object; 
it is, in fact, just the objectifying principle of mind. 
Again, too, we ‘remark that the whole question of the 



The American State . 


r 5 

State hinges upon an examination of the content of the 
Will. 

The first difficulty which shows itself in our way is 
the great variety of this content; indeed, it is quite as 
various as human activity itself. It is furnished en¬ 
tirely from two sources, Emotion and Intelligence. 

To begin with the first of these forms, we shall call 
the Will which has Emotion for its content, the natural 
Will, since the emotions or feelings are directly con¬ 
nected with the physical organization. It is needless to 
tell the reader how much of his activity depends upon 
this principle of his nature, nor is it in place here. But 
what does concern us is that some men seem to think 
that the content of the State is furnished by a feeling, 
as benevolence or happiness. But if we compare the 
reality of the State, that is, the State as it acts and 
must act, with any emotional content, we find that the 
latter is disregarded in every essential governmental 
function. Happiness and benevolence are not ends of 
the State, when it enters upon—and indeed, must enter 
upon—a long, bloody, and uncertain war. Moreover, 
if the State is a benevolent institution, its prosperity, 
nay, its existence, must depend upon its stock of beg¬ 
gars; or if happiness be the test, with the last unhappy 
man the State must die. Such a view would not seem 
to furnish a very positive or permanent basis of things. 

But even if this reasoning be deemed unsatisfactory, 
there is still a fatal deficiency in every emotional content 
for the State. It leaves out of account the very thing 
which makes its own reality, namely, Will. According 
to this view, the State is realized Will, with some emo¬ 
tion for its content; what then is to secure the Will 
which realizes this content? For the content can not 



i6 


The American State . 


possess any reality without Will, that is can not be at all 
in the world. Such a theory, therefore, dries up its 
source, cuts off its own head. A State which has happi¬ 
ness whether it be of one person, or of the majority, or 
of all, as its highest end, can not logically assert self- 
preservation, for thus it has an end higher than the 
highest. Hence the emotional nature of man can not 
furnish the content of the State. 

But in the second division of the subject we have to 
examine the various contents or ends given to Will by 
Intelligence. These ends are in the first place finite, 
that is, not ultimate. For instance the thought of the 
reaping machine is conceived by the mind and executed 
by the Will; the man who makes it has it as the end 
given by his Intelligence. But it is only an instrument 
to bring about another end which is in the mind of the 
same or a different man, namely, the cutting of a crop 
of wheat. But the crop of wheat is not a final end, but 
a means for some other end which in its turn will again 
be a means. And so the series may be continued in¬ 
definitely. These contents we shall call the finite ends 
of Intelligence, since they are not absolute, and the 
Will which is occupied with them may be named finite 
Will. Their characteristic is to have an end external to 
themselves, to be really means for something else and 
not ends. The reader will observe how universal is 
this class of contents of the Will; they embrace quite 
the whole of the ordinary conscious activity of man. 
All mechanical employments, all commercial occupa¬ 
tions, the struggles of ambition, nay, for the most part, 
the deeds of virtue are manifestations of the finite ends 
of Intelligence. 

In fact, not a few theorists have held that this fini- 



The American State . 


l 7 


tude is the only possible form of Intelligence. But the 
point of interest for our discussion is that many per¬ 
sons think that the State is merely an instrument for 
carrying out some finite end, which is external to itself, 
and many more persons take the same for granted with¬ 
out thinking at all. Thus the State is a machine for 
digging a canal, or building a railroad, a sort of gen¬ 
eral scullion for all kinds of dirty or disagreeable work. 
So the reaping-machine is for securing the harvest, an 
end external to itself. Now I believe that the State 
can build a railroad or any other work; but mark the 
distinction, the State is not for the railroad, but the 
railroad for the State, it must be a direct means for 
accomplishing the end of the State. 

If we now closely inspect this view, we shall find 
that it has the same defect which was before remarked 
concerning the emotions. Such a finite content for the 
Will always secures something else besides the Will itself, 
and thus disregards the very thing that constitutes its 
own reality, namely, Will. For it is the Will which exe¬ 
cutes all, which realizes all, even the pettiest end of 
intelligence, which is, indeed, the source of all power; 
confessedly the mightiest of all instruments, or rather, 
the instrument of all possible instruments, ought 
not some attention to be paid to its safety ? Perhaps, 
however, it may be thought to be something unassaila¬ 
ble and indestructible, and hence needing no protec¬ 
tion. 

But a little reflection will convince us of the con¬ 
trary, indeed, will show us that Will is quite the only 
thing human to which wrong can be done. Recollect 
the distinction before made, that true Will is not sub¬ 
jective but is a realization. Now different Wills may 





i8 


The American State. 


have different ends, and hence contradictory of each oth¬ 
er; the result is a conflict in which one Will in realizing 
itself destroys another Will which has been already real¬ 
ized. The logical result is the destruction of Will, 
namely, of will as realization, for it has annihilated it¬ 
self. What follows ? All human endeavor, all works 
of mankind, all rights are swept away in the twinkle of 
the thought. Hence the Will, the great instrument- 
maker, must now make a new instrument whose object 
is to secure itself, or to employ a more exact statement, 
the content of the Will which Intelligence now furnishes 
is the Will itself. The latter has no longer any external 
end alien and hostile to itself, but it seeks purely its 
own realization. With this new content, we have a 
third form of the Will which will be presently named. 

If we were now to bring together all the various instru¬ 
ments of the world, and attempt to select the one which 
•fits the above description, whose object is to secure the 
existence of Will, which one would it be ? Let the rea¬ 
der exercise his ingenuity in finding it. First, he will 
have to exclude all those instruments whose end is be¬ 
yond themselves, which are only a means for something 
else. Moreover, such an instrument can hardly be 
seen with the naked eye, not being a sensuous thing; a 
spiritual vision, therefore, is required in order to dis¬ 
cern it. Still further, that form of mental discernment 
which can only comprehend a finite relation as means 
to an end, would be manifestly insufficient, if our pre¬ 
ceding discussion was correct in its results. Nay, 
though I have used the word above, and must continue 
to use it in certain contingencies, it is not truly an in¬ 
strument, for this generally signifies something used for 
a purpose extraneous to itself; whereas this cunning 



The American State. 


9 


device is employed to create itself, is self-end, its ob¬ 
ject is itself. It is the Will which secures Will, hence 
secures itself. But if we look at that instrument which 
administers justice, makes and executes the laws which 
are the real embodiment of justice, there will not be much 
difficulty in seeing that it has one grand object, to se¬ 
cure to man his Will, and* moreover, that it too must be 
a Will in order to will his Will. Such an instrument as 
the one just described is easily recognized to be the 
State. 

We have thus arrived at the formula upon which 
this and the succeeding discussions must rest, which is 
the germ of all political science: the State is the Will 
which wills Will. Such is the ultimate content which 
Intelligence has now furnished, a content which can be 
grasped only in oneway, by thinking. It is true that 
this formula sounds like a jingle or play upon words, 
but thought does not go by the sound. Its meaning 
can be reached solely by thought and not by the senses 
or even the imagination. The Will has thus a content as 
broad as itself, and hence it has now for the first time a 
universal and therefore rational content. This form of 
the Will may accordingly be called the rational Will. 

We have thus distinguished three contents, each of 
which give name and character to a form of the Will. 
With that of emotion, it is the natural Will; with that 
of the finite ends of intelligence, it is the finite Will; 
with that of the Will itself, wherein the Will is its own 
content, it is the rational Will. This last is the basis 
of the two other forms, for it secures the realization of 
the Will, without which they can have no secure reality. 
Hence, too, they are capricious; it rests with the indi¬ 
vidual to take what content he pleases, but the content 



20 


The American State. 


of the rational Will must be taken for man to be ra¬ 
tional. Caprice, therefore, may be defined as that 
form of Will which has any other content except that of 
the Will itself, it is simply not rational Will. This is 
not quite the usage of the word, but it will be under¬ 
stood. 

A glance into the above analysis will reveal important 
results. The State is thus shown to be the logical con¬ 
sequence of the nature of Will; grant a man this activity 
and he cannot stop short of the State. It follows by 
the most rigid necessity. For the will, with all its man¬ 
ifold content of desires, feelings, ends, must have, as 
its pre-supposition, its own existence, its own reality, 
for if it is not real, then it is no Will. Hence it must 
return to itself as its ultimate ground, the Will must 
will and realize itself, which realization we have already 
identified as the State. The fact to be noted, therefore, 
is that the act of every individual, however humble, his 
mere exercise of the Will involves the State, and were 
that act unfolded in all its logical results, there would be 
a complete deduc tion of the State. Were there only 
one rational being in existence, there would still be 
manifested, though not realized, in him the State. He 
could not be the complete realization of the Will, since 
there is thus no real antithesis between the individual 
and the State ; the latter stands not forth in the world, 
but is still in the individual. Hence the beginning of 
man’s activity is the beginning of the State, to enter it 
or not lies not in his choice, but it is the deepest neces¬ 
sity of his nature to exist in a government. 

We are also now prepared to comprehend the relation 
of the individual to the State. Both are Wills, and in 
their true thought both have the same content. For the 




The American State . 


2 I 


individual must will the existence of Will ; wherever 
or under whatever form it has been realized, from the 
property of his neighbor up to the government of his 
country, he respects it as sacred ; such is the truly good 
man. The State, on its side, also wills the existence of 
Will, hence both have the same content, the same end. 
These two extremes are thus united, the contradiction 
between them is harmonized, and the great difficulty of 
all political and moral philosophers, the reconciliation 
of individual rights with governmental institutions at 
once vanishes. But the moment we take any other con¬ 
tent for the Will than the one mentioned, the contradic¬ 
tion between the individual and authority appears as an 
insoluble problem. And so it is, for when we have a 
man pursuing his ends as absolute, and the State its ends 
as absolute, is there any mediation possible in case of a 
collision ? The only reconciliation is that both will 
Will, hence have the same end ; thus the individual can 
not nullify the law nor assail the State, for it would then 
destroy Will; nor can the State put down the Will of 
the individual, for the same reason. 

Two questions probably arise in the mind of the 
reader at this point. First, suppose the individual as¬ 
sails the State by his acts of Will, is the State then to will 
his Will ? Certainly. Secondly, suppose the State 
seeks the destruction of the individual Will, must the 
latter Will be the State’s Will ? Certainly. The first 
of these questions implies the negative relation of the 
individual to the State, and its true answer must exhibit 
the basis of the Right of Punishment. The second 
question implies the negative relation of the State to 
the individual, and its true answer must exhibit the basis 
of the Right of Revolution. These are both pretty 



22 


\the American State. 


large themes, and we shall have to treat of them in dif¬ 
ferent connection. It may be said, however, that a 
valid basis for them can only be deduced from the 
thought of the Will willing Will. These negative rela¬ 
tions result from the fact that a person and a State are 
both individualities, possessed of distinct Wills which 
may agree or disagree, unite or collide. 

The mediation of the individual with the State, the 
most important of all questions for the citizen, we thus 
see accomplished in the formula: the Will which wills 
Will. Now this principle, as before indicated, can only 
be given by thought. An intense feeling for country 
is not enough ; patriotism is not knowledge, and hence 
is likely to destroy the very object which it is seeking,, 
nor can it tell when it is destroying the same. The 
individual citizen must, therefore, think, but above all 
is this necessary in a free State, the most complete real¬ 
ization of Will. As a voter he is called upon to decide 
the policy of his country; that policy, if it be hostile 
to the thought of the State, can only end in its subver¬ 
sion. But, particularly, the individual must not be 
seduced into placing his own subjective ends in conflict 
with the great end of government, whether those ends 
be of ambition or gain, or bear the more sanctified title 
of conscience, or law of God. On the other hand, the 
State has the same content and hence it, too, must think,, 
it has a known end which it must realize. It knows and 
wills as any individual, only not capriciously, for its 
content is always itself, hence is necessary. This dis¬ 
tinction is of capital significance; the State is the 
absolutely rational individual, whose Will is always uni¬ 
versal, a law, whose duty it is to subordinate caprice and 
unreason. The true State, therefore, must think, that 



'The American State. 


2 3 


is, must know its own thought; based upon anything 
short of this, it can only possess a transitory existence. 

A practical application of these principles lies not far 
off. The Government of the United States always 
reposed more upon instinct and feeling than upon con¬ 
scious thought. The result is that it is beginning to turn 
against itself, and to destroy the very object for which 
it exists. The time has come when the people must 
comprehend the thought of their State, if they wish to 
remain sovereigns of a free country. The idea of a ruler 
who is ignorant of the form of government which he is 
administering is not favorable to its perpetuity. All the 
dangers of the present proceed not from any external 
power, but from within, from the violation of the fund¬ 
amental national thought which has become obscured in 
the minds of the people. Heretofore we held it im¬ 
plicitly, until we now find it slipping from our grasp. 
The great awakening and the new dawn will be when 
that grand national thought, purified of its former dark¬ 
ness, shall rise into the clear consciousness of the 
American citizen. Such a result, however, can only be 
accomplished by thought. 

Hence, it is the most practical of all questions, not¬ 
withstanding its theoretical aspect, to re-examine and 
re-state the foundation of government. It is by no 
means an idle problem of metaphysics, which can be 
dismissed to the secluded study of the philosopher. 
Nor can it be any longer the exclusive property of the 
few, but it must be brought home to the many, who are 
are now the rulers. It must be burnt, as it were, into 
the consciousness of the people, so that it forms the ult¬ 
imate ground of all their activity. But I hear some one 
say, “ Government is a practical science.” The pre- 



24 


^he American State . 


supposition here is, that theory and practice are irrecon¬ 
cilable contradictions. How often does this false and 
wretched assumption paralyze the thoughts of men ! Is 
not practice rational ? If it be, must not reason be able 
to enunciate its own principles ? Rational theory only 
tells what rational practice does ; the substance of both 
is the same. 

Our country hitherto wa!s the most complete mani¬ 
festation of Will willing Will that history has produced ; 
in other words, the most perfect State, and I think that 
it is possible to improve much upon what it was. One 
thing is certain, we can never go back to that first con¬ 
dition of our national existence no more than we can go 
back before the Declaration of Independence, no more 
than mankind can return to Paradise. But the country 
is now passing through the fires of self-contradiction; it 
is denying, on many sides, its own thoughts, its own 
reason, which means, in the end, the denial of its exist¬ 
ence. The anxious question is, will it withstand the 
terrible ordeal, or die under the surgeon’s knife ? 



NO. 3.-THE CONSTITUTIONAL STATE. 


In the preceding article the object was to evolve the 
fundamental principle of the State from the nature of 
the Will. We beheld the individual rise into the pro¬ 
portions of the State by the necessity of his own acti¬ 
vity. The Will with its multiplicity of objects comes to 
grasp itself, to realize itself as its own content. This 
realization is the State which was therefore defined in a 
general way to be the will which wills Will. Such is 
the formula which must be the germ of all the deduc¬ 
tions which are to follow, and it will be continually re¬ 
called and repeated. But here two warnings may pro¬ 
perly be given to the reader in order to avoid any mis¬ 
understanding of the argument. In the first place it 
must not be imagined by the above language that the 
State makes its appearance in time after man has exam¬ 
ined and discovered the inadequacy of the various con¬ 
tents of Will. On the contrary it was shown that 
every act of Will, logically considered, pre-supposes the 
State as its own true realization. Hence some form of 
government is found in every condition of human ex¬ 
istence. It may be rude, simple and inadequate, never¬ 
theless it is. Will, as the great realizer of all things, 
must itself also be real ; otherwise it flies from, it 
denies its own fundamental principle. Therefore, a 
Will without a State is a contradiction in terms and 
simply annihilates itself. But the second warning must 
be mentioned. Some persons may still be troubled 
with the reflection that a reaping machine for example is 
also a realization of the Will and hence does not differ 
in definition from the State. But always notice the. 


26 


The American State . 


content which furnishes the basis of these distinctions. 
The Will in making a reaping machine has a content 
different from itself; the State is the Will which has 
itself as content. This definition carefully kept in 
mind will, I think, furnish the key to every difficulty. 

Such is the first great movement of our principle: 
the rise of the individual to the State. But it must 
not be viewed in the light of a dead abstraction. On 
the contrary it is eternally active, and must* eternally 
be active while the State is a living organism. The 
individual is only in this way resumed into the higher 
principle of his rationality, and therefore the process 
of ascent into State must be continued as long as there 
are individuals. For the State, like the human body, is 
always reproduced in order to have life. It is thus that 
we arrive at the insight that the State must have a 
means for resuming the individual Will into itself, and 
that such resumption can not happen once for all, but 
must be continually taking place. Now what govern¬ 
mental function is occupied with this duty ? Evidently 
the Legislative, for it is the instrumentality by which 
the consciousness of the people is collected and ex¬ 
pressed in a permanent form in laws and institutions. 
For these must spring from and rest upon the spirit of 
man ; without such a basis they stand in the clouds. 
It is the law-making process whereby man transmutes 
his thought, his consciousness into a real and universal 
form. Thus the State is created, and hence its primal 
function is some method of legislation, which also 
remains a necessary and permanent element of it in 
every stage of its existence. 

But now let us consider the reverse process. If the 
individual must beget the State, so on the contrary the 







The American State. 


2 7 


State returns and secures the individual. This is in¬ 
volved in the formula which has already been deduced : 
the Will which wills Will. The State is therefore the 
absolutely rational individual which has no caprice, 
since it must always have will as its content. It can 
not, therefore, if it be true to its end, run off to a 
thousand other things and select what object it pleases, 
like the ordinary man. It is limited to the realization 
of Will, yet within this sphere its authority is abso¬ 
lute. Wherever there is an exercise of the will, it is 
sacred, and must be protected. Let it be good or bad, 
the individual must have his Will secured to himself. 
It is his holiest right, indeed, the basis of every right; 
it is, moreover, a right which he has found a special in¬ 
strument to maintain—the State. If he commits a 
crime, it is nevertheless his Will which must be secured 
to him. The State thus brings home to every man the 
value of his deed. If it be wicked, which means if it 
destroy in some form the existence of Will, then his 
Will must logically perish, for it has sought the destruc¬ 
tion of Will, that is, the destruction of itself, which 
destruction, since it is Will, must be secured to him. 
But if the deed be good, that is, if it will the existence 
of Will, then it must be protected, for the State itself 
is just such a Will. Here is seen the element of jus¬ 
tice which it is one of the chief functions of the State 
to administer. It secures Will, by it every man re¬ 
ceives what his deed is worth. We thus see that the 
second movement of our thought has a real, active ex¬ 
istence in government. 

The next step is to comprehend the third and final 
stage of this process. It has just been seen that the 
State is an instrument for giving validity to every 




28 


The American State . 


man’s act, in other words, for administering justice to 
the world. It has furthermore been shown and is de¬ 
clared in our formula that this instrument is also a Will, 
and hence a Will which has itself as content. Thus it 
is an instrument to secure the entire realm of Will, not 
merely that of individuals, but since this very instru¬ 
ment is itself Will, it must above all things secure 
itself. That is (to give the same thought another turn) 
the State is to secure Will, and hence it must before 
everything else secure the instrument of the same, 
which is itself. Here is seen the basis for the ultimate 
maxim of all nationality : the safety of the State is the 
supreme law. This principle is not therefore a mere 
assumption of power, for it is vindicated by the most 
rigid logic. The State would otherwise be the most 
terrific contradiction, for though it exists to secure all 
Will, yet it would then neglect Will in its highest man¬ 
ifestation, namely, the State. It is thus plain that the 
formula, the State is the Will which secures Will, at 
once includes and reconciles its two quite^opposite func¬ 
tions, that of securing the individual Will on the one 
hand, and of securing itself on the other. Nor can 
there be any doubt which of these two principles is the 
higher, and therefore the one to which validity must be 
given in the case of a collision between them, a thing 
which unfortunately sometimes happens. The individ¬ 
ual’s right of existence is subordinate to the State’s 
right of existence. 

Let us now examine this last result and designate its 
character somewhat more precisely. The law of self- 
preservation was declared to be the ultimate law of the 
State. It is bound to defend its own existence against 
everything else. Here arises upon our view a new 



The American State. 


2 9 


principle which may be called the individuality of the 
State. The world now divides up into a number of in¬ 
dividual States, for such is the general principle. Each 
is a limit to all the rest, excludes all the rest, asserts 
itself against all the rest. Note that a State can be the 
only limit for a State, since it subordinates everything 
else to its own individuality except just this principle 
of individuality, which is also in the neighboring 
State. This is a most important principle, for up¬ 
on it rests the vindication of the independence and 
the unity of every nation. Our last result is therefore 
the individual State asserting itself and excluding 
others, united and independent. Here is also a func¬ 
tion, the function of the unity and individuality of the 
State, which can hence be truly represented by only 
one individual, the Monarch or President. 

Three different elements have in this manner shown 
themselves in the process of the State, any one of 
which being absent would destroy*the whole. First is 
the resumption of the individual into the State ; sec¬ 
ondly, the return of the State to the protection of the 
individual; thirdly, the assertion of the State through 
itself constituting its own individuality. These prin¬ 
ciples have moreover proved themselves to be not 
merely the abstract deductions of thought or the idle 
figments of fancy, but to possess reality in the highest 
degree, to be in fact, just the essence of the State. 
They can be pointed out in all governments, they con¬ 
stitute the fundamental divisions of political science. 

One step further. This threefold process of the 
State, this tri-partite organization of government, which 
has thus been deduced from the nature of the Will, and 
which when realized forms the three great political func- 




30 


The American State. 


tions, what shall it be called? Its name is the Constitu¬ 
tion. Thus we have developed the general thought of 
the State into the more specific thought of the Constitu¬ 
tion, and the total result at which we have arrived may 
be denominated the Constitutional State, an excellent 
landing place in our undertaking. Here we shall for 
the present stop in the course of our deduction and go 
back to pick up some important threads hitherto neces¬ 
sarily neglected. 

A complete comprehension of the above statements 
will enable every one to see through the mist which 
theory has thrown around this whole subject. The 
grand axiom of American and English political litera¬ 
ture, is, that government is instituted for the protec¬ 
tion of person and property, that is, to secure the indi¬ 
vidual Will. Undoubtedly, this is one of its functions, 
as has before been indicated, but it is not all. Thus a 
State could not logically defend itself, and how wide¬ 
spread was such an opinion at the beginning of the late 
war ? I know the answer which is ready : “ The State 
in protecting itself is simply protecting person and 
property.” But it destroys person and property, it 
sacrifices thousands of lives and spends millions of 
money. If this be protection, then destruction is pro¬ 
tection, and thought is forever giving the lie to itself 
The true solution of the difficulty is to broaden the 
view of the State and to take it in its whole compass as 
the Will which wills Will. 

It is also sometimes supposed that the condition of 
the highest freedom is the state of Nature. But Will 
is there least of all willed by man ; on the contrary it 
is trampled upon by the strongest. It is true that if 
freedom be caprice, this is the great world of freedom ; 



The American State. 


3 


but if it be the willing of Will, then this is the condi¬ 
tion of absolute unfreedom. The declaration is often 
made too, that man parts with some of his freedom 
when he enters the State. The truth is he then gets it 
tor the first time, for previously it had no realization 
in the world. The notion has also been very prevalent 
that the State is a contract between its individual mem¬ 
bers. But the very condition of the contract is the 
State, since it is the latter which gives validity to the 
individual Will upon which contract is based. Such a 
theory besides many special objections, has the one 
general objection : it implies the existence of the very 
thing which it is trying to account for. 

The State which absolutely fulfills the above-men¬ 
tioned test in the perfect State, and in so far as it falls 
short of the same, it is to this extent imperfect. That 
no State at present in existence comes up to this standard 
needs hardly be said, nor any State that ever has been 
in existence. But we are now in the possession of a 
criterion by which to judge of the State: it must be 
the complete realization and security of Will. Every 
essential stage of consciousness in the history of the 
world must have its State, for this is its true reality. 
H ence the governments which have existed may be re¬ 
garded as so many approaches to the complete thought 
of Will. They have all fallen short, perfection has not 
yet been attained, but there has been an unceasing 
movement towards making the State correspond to its 
idea without flaw or blemish. 

It maybe said here that even the despotism if it be 
permanent, must rest upon the national Will. This 
cannot be denied. But in such a case the Will is con¬ 
tradictory of itself, it wills to have no Will of its own, 







3 2 


'I'he American State , 


to destroy itself, and realizes this Will in a State. Now 
the difficulty is that such is just the consciousness of 
the people, from which spring all institutions. The 
progress of government has been to get rid of this 
contradiction, to secure Will, not to destroy the same, 
or to base itself on a Will which wills its own destruc¬ 
tion. The movement has been a slow one, and its 
various phases give the different gradations of States, 
ancient and modern. 

H ere is the proper pjace for considering that much- 
abused word, freedom, and its different meanings. 
They are all derived from the various contents of the 
Will. Just as there is a capricious Will, so there is a 
capricious freedom which springs from some emotion or 
some finite end of Intelligence. This kind of freedom 
is legitimate and necessary within its province, but the 
citizen of a State must be able to rise above it. For 
there is also a rational freedom which originates in the 
rational Will, which always regards the freedom of 
others, in general it is an individual Will whose content 
is Will in all its manifestations. Such a content is 
therefore given to it, on the one hand by itself and on 
the other hand by the real world ; it is therefore neces¬ 
sary. The State and institutions already exist which 
the individual must will. There is no choice, caprice 
is cut off, man must be rational unless he chooses the 
opposite, namely, to be irrational ; there is only one 
option remaining inside of reason. 

Such is the highest thought of freedom, a thought 
which takes in the whole field of Will. It should be 
the underlying principle of action for every citizen of 
the Republic. He ought to rise above the narrow aims 
of the individual into an universal life; what rights he 







The American State . 


33 


demands for himself, he should concede to all. Wher¬ 
ever he finds Will, especially in its highest realized 
forms in the Constitution and laws of the country and 
of each particular State, he should respect it with a re¬ 
ligious awe. Let him once begin to tear down these 
sacred institutions with violence, and though the locality 
may not be his own neighborhood, soon it will be found 
that every blow at a distant part is only a thrust at his 
own vitals. He is thus logically destroying Will, a de¬ 
struction which must ultimately sweep back and include 
his own State, his own community, himself. For he is 
uprooting in his own mind the very consciousness upon 
which the institutions of his country repose. He is 
hence not only preparing himself for the loss of liberty, 
but he is nursing to life the usurper by arming his 
rulers with such unwarrantable powers. The citizen of 
the United States must be truly universal in his thought 
and sympathy, he must know and feel the wrong done 
to a distant State with the same intensity as if an out¬ 
rage had been perpetrated at his own door. It will be 
a degenerate age when an American can look with indif¬ 
ference on any species of injustice and oppression ; but 
woe be to him when heated by the passions of war or 
inflamed by the zeal of party, he not only applauds but 
demands the destruction of the fundamental principles 
of his government. 



NO. 4.-THE CONSTITUTIONAL CONFEDERACY. 


In our last essay there was attempted a logical deduc¬ 
tion of the three functions of government which are 
commonly called the Legislative, the Judicial and the 
Executive. We saw them springing by the most rigid 
necessity from the thought of the State. There was no 
argumentation from utility or from experience, both of 
of which, however, would confirm all that was said ; but 
these functions were evolved directly from the funda¬ 
mental conception of government. They are only in¬ 
strumentalities for realizing the great end of the State, 
which end is to secure Will. The sum total or body 
of these instrumentalities in their detailed development 
has also a specific appellation : the Constitution, which 
expresses the organization of the State. 

The Constitution may therefore be declared to be the 
realized definition of those instrumentalities which 
secure Will. I say definition realized , for I do not mean 
merely a definition in words. A constitution must be 
something real, existing in the world, with certain defi¬ 
nite limitations. Such is a real definition of an object; 
the main question concerning it is, what has it defined 
itself to be ? In this sense a constitution or form of 
government may be said to be a nation’s definition of 
freedom. For it is that which the nation has realized 
and put into activity ; it is a real definition. This may, 
or may not, coincide with the speculative theories of 
some individual members of that nation ; if it does not, 
their definition is unreal, abstract, and is not national. 
Hence all constitutions may be taken as so many defini- 


The American State . 


35 


tions of freedom, given by the different peoples of the 
world, all of which have one common object, the secu¬ 
rity of Will. 

Moreover this definition may or may not be written 
out in a specific form. The mere fact of writing, or 
even expression, does not affect the reality of the defi- 
tion ; it exists all the same, there it is, and everybody 
can see it at work. But the written constitution is the 
more complete definition. For the nation has thus 
become self-conscious; it can scan its own operations 
more perfectly; it possesses an absolute criterion of its 
own conduct. As conscious activity is higher and more 
rational than instinctive activity, so a written constitu¬ 
tion, provided it springs from the national consciousness 
is superior to an unwritten one. Indeed there is a na¬ 
tion which seems, if the arguments of its publicists 
mean anything, to be just in the contradiction : to have 
an unwritten constitution which is written. 

But here a confusion must be avoided. Constitu¬ 
tions may be written by individuals or by nations. In 
the former case the nation takes the first good opportu¬ 
nity to tear it to pieces, for the simple reason that the 
document is not its own. France has had a dozen or 
so of these written constitutions of individuals, but 
none yet of the nation. Many men have in their benev¬ 
olence undertaken to make constitutions under which 
the people ought to be happy; but alas, benevolence 
will not make a constitution. The individual who 
wishes to write a constitution must content himself with 
being an humble scribe, noting down only what the 
spirit of the nation whispers in his ear. Yet what a 
mighty scribe would that be, mightiest among men, for 
he can distinguish the universal reason from his own 



36 


The American State. 


subjective notions, or rather his thought is one with 
that reason. 

The nation thus defines itself in the constitution. 
This definition will be complete in proportion as it 
rests upon the absolute comprehension of the State. 
Thus a people whose thought of the State, or I might 
say, whose thought in general is inadequate, one-sided, 
and intolerant must exhibit the same features in their 
constitution. For they can only realize what is in them 
and not what they have not. It is this general condi¬ 
tion of a nation’s intelligence which is often called the 
national consciousness. Upon it repose the validity and 
success of all institutions. These same institutions 
being transplanted to a different country, soon wither 
and die. What is the reason ? Because they have no 
root in the consciousness of the people ; they were the 
offspring of another national spirit. Nearly every coun¬ 
try of Europe has sought within the last century to 
naturalize the English constitution, but without success. 

It will perhaps assist the comprehension of this sub¬ 
ject by adding that a nation defines itself in other ways 
besides through its constitution. It can, indeed must 
give expression to its fundamental thought in its litera¬ 
ture, its religion, its philosophy. They have one com¬ 
mon foundation, the national consciousness ; that is, if 
they be truly national. How completely oriental abso¬ 
lutism, oriental religion, oriental art, spring from one 
common thought. Though these forms are distinct, 
the essence, the spirit is the same; it is the same defi¬ 
nition, though the language be different. One of these 
definitions, therefore, is the State, or more precisely the 
constitution. Moreover it defines that thought in a 
special direction, namely the thought of freedom. Or 



The American State. 


37 


to use the phraseology already employed, it is the na¬ 
tion’s definition of the instrumentalities for securing 
Will. The constitution is, therefore, the Will-defini¬ 
tion of nation ; its religious, artistic, and philosophic 
definitions belong not to the present subject and will be 
dismissed. The point which we now wish to emphasize 
is, that it is the Constitution which makes any given 
State what it is; in other words, constitutes its individ¬ 
uality. 

We have thus followed the rise of the individual per¬ 
son into the individual State. The latter has also 
organized itself with its various functions in the consti¬ 
tution, which, whether written or unwritten, must ex¬ 
press the innermost spirit of a people, and must distin¬ 
guish its government from that of all other peoples. 
Thus there arises a new organism ; a new individual 
against other individuals; that is, the State with its 
boundaries and peculiarities against other States. As 
every State is itself and no other, having its own con¬ 
sciousness, so the expressions of this consciousness in 
the constitution must be peculiar to itself. Such is what 
shall hereafter be called the individuality of the State. 
We shall now take up this new principle and unfold it 
in its logical consequences. 

It has already been attempted to prove that the State 
is a Will; it is now shown that such a Will is the indi¬ 
vidual Will of a State. The latter thus stands in rela¬ 
tion to other States which also have their individual 
Wills. Just as we saw persons with a variety of Wills, 
so we now see States with a variety of Wills. More¬ 
over the same collision arises, a collision inherent in 
individuality. Each individual State asserts itself, at¬ 
tempts to make its principle universal. Thus it assails 



38 


The American State . 


other States and subsumes them. Now the essential 
insight here is the fact, that in so doing it is simply- 
destroying its own individuality, for were it to be¬ 
come universal, it would be no longer individual, there 
would be no other States from which it could be distin¬ 
guished ; they would be all swallowed up, that is indi¬ 
viduality would be swallowed up. Hence such a State 
is destroying all the time what it is attempting to main¬ 
tain. This is the contradiction which war involves, the 
conquering State logically commits suicide. For by- 
conquest it has destroyed an individual State, and 
thereby it saps its own fundamental principle of exist¬ 
ence which must be the existence of the individual State. 
Its own conduct carried to its results must end in its 
own destruction. 

This negative relation of individual States to one 
another is known in the history of the world as war. 
In fact history hitherto has recounted but little more 
than these struggles, in which one State is trying to 
absorb another, and the latter is resisting with little or 
great determination. The sympathy of mankind is 
always in favor of individuality, in favor of national 
independence, against the State which seeks to destroy 
the same. For the instinct of all peoples has told them 
that this was the great boon, and reason has vindicated 
the same view. Hence a nation which is based upon con¬ 
quest must pass away. Thus all the great empires of the 
ancient world perished, for they were contradictions in 
themselves, and such empires must perish, for they bear 
in themselves the seeds of their own destruction. War 
of conquest thus has this contradiction, what it seeks to 
establish, it destroys; the paean of victory, were it 
truly heard, is the knell of destruction. The lessons 



The American State. 


39 


of history upon this point are so recent and so startling, 
that no examples are necessary. 

When this negative relation merely ceases, we have 
peace. When the States begin to recognize the individ¬ 
ual existence of each other, then we have the period of 
treaties, pertaining chiefly to commercial intercourse. 
Then follows the alliance which is the union of several 
States into one individuality for a certain time and with 
some definite purpose, as to preserve the balance of 
power or to make war in common upon some nation. 
A more complete historical evolution of these stages will 
hereafter be given ; at present it will suffice to observe 
that there is seen in them a regular approach to the re¬ 
cognition of nationality. 

We thus see that the individuality of the State by 
itself, in its one-sided assertion, can only bring forth 
its destruction ; it annihilates what it would preserve. 
With the destruction of the State follows the destruc¬ 
tion of Will, of freedom, for therein its instrumentality 
is destroyed. The individual State with its constitu¬ 
tion shows on this side its inadequacy to secure Will. It 
breaks down, manifests in war its finite side. This is 
true of the conquering State, and much more is it true 
of the conquered State. That great instrumentality 
for securing Will is thus insufficient for its end, and 
man must seek out some additional instrumentality, 
before he can be said to have completely secured Will. 
What then is it? Fortunately it is at hand, it has 
already been implied in the foregoing remarks. We are 
now ready to make the transition from the Constitu¬ 
tional State to the Constitutional Confederacy. 

In order that a State may secure its own existence, it 
must not destroy other States, for thus it wills the de- 



40 


The American State . 


struction of the individual State, and hence itself. But 
what can it do? Only one thing: recognize the exist¬ 
ence of the individual State as its absolute principle. 
Thus only can it be consistent with itself, free itself 
from the contradiction of war and be preserved. For 
it now recognizes that its right is the right of every 
State, hence it can no more raise its hand against its 
neighbor than against itself, and moreover it also recog¬ 
nizes that the right of its neighbor is its right, and will 
not for a moment allow the same to be assailed. Right 
has now reached its truest, highest characteristic, namely 
to be universal. Thus we have among nations the 
great principle of the recognition of national individ¬ 
uality or nationality. 

But this is not enough. Were it to stop here the 
best fruits of this principle would be in danger of being 
lost. The next step is, the recognition of nationality 
must be realized , must be given an existence in the 
world, for merely as recognition, it remains without 
power, it is a sort of national caprice, since it rests with 
the individual State to follow it or not. Just as we 
derived the State as the realization of the individual 
Will, so now we must have a realization of the Will of 
the individual State. The logical process is the same. 
The individual wills Will and brings forth the State; 
but the latter too has developed an individual, 
finite side, and fails to secure Will, through danger of 
being destroyed from without. Next follows the final 
step, the last and greatest stadium of history, namely, 
the State must will the existence of the individual State 
as universal principle, must realize this principle in a 
new form of government, and must define that form of 
government in a new constitution. Thus the recogni- 



The American State. 


4i 


tion above mentioned becomes a reality, is embodied in 
an instrument which can enforce its end, and no longer 
is a matter merely of the individual State. As we had 
above the Constitutional State, so now we have the 
Confederacy of States with a constitution also, whose 
sole object, whose entire content can only be the con¬ 
servation of the individual State. All its instrumen¬ 
talities, all its provisions, all its interpretations must 
spring from this one thought and be justified by it, 
else they are wholly unjustifiable. Such a form of gov¬ 
ernment of which only one has hitherto appeared in any 
degree of perfection may be called the Constitutional 
Confederacy as distinguished from the Constitutional 
State. 

It will be observed that to bring forth such a govern¬ 
ment, there are two grand pre-suppositions. The first 
one is, that the national consciousness must have risen 
to the point of recognition as above developed, the na¬ 
tion must be permeated with the idea of universal jus¬ 
tice, which freely allows to all, both individuals and 
States, the same right that it demands for itself and its 
State. This national consciousness will become a 
reality in the above form of government, will define 
itself necessarily in the same; on the other hand, such 
a government can only exist by having this national 
consciousness as its foundation. If that once be lost, 
then the entire superstructure must tumble to ruin. 
The second pre-supposition is that there must be a 
number of States which reach this stage of conscious¬ 
ness about the same time, for each one must recognize 
the national individuality of the others. If there be 
but one individual person there can be no real State; 
in like manner if there be but one State, there can be 



42 


The American State . 


no real Confederacy, though the logical basis of it be 
present. 

On a review of the preceding topics it will be no¬ 
ticed that three distinctions have been made which, if 
correct, sweep the entire field of political science : 

I. The individual State organized in its constitution 
which may be called the Constitutional State. 

II. The external relation of these individual States 
to one another in its manifold forms of war, peace, 
treaty, alliance and finally of international law; the 
growth of recognition. 

III. The absolute union and at the same time pre¬ 
servation of individual States in the Constitutional Con¬ 
federacy. 

It has been stated above that there is but one nation 
which has realized this last form of government to any 
degree of perfection—the United States. It shall be 
our pleasant duty hereafter to recount the origin, 
growth, and struggles of this principle in the history of 
the world, and its final triumph in the Federal Consti¬ 
tution. At present there is only room for one prac¬ 
tical application. In the Constitutional Confederacy 
there are two principles, seemingly of the most contra¬ 
dictory nature, combined into perfect harmony, that of 
union on the one hand and that of the individuality of 
the State on the other. Now if either of these princi¬ 
ples be asserted in their abstraction, in their one-sided¬ 
ness and not in their concrete unity, there arises a doc¬ 
trine which, if carried out, can only end in the subver¬ 
sion of this form of government. If the individuality 
of the State be insisted upon in its one-sidedness, then 
we fall back into the second stage above given, the stage 
of struggling fighting nationalities. Moreover this doc- 



The American State. 


43 


trine simply destroys that which it sought to accom¬ 
plish; in its solicitude to preserve the individual State, 
it has laid it open on all sides, from within and from 
without, to destruction. For if our previous reasoning 
has been correct, we have shown that the ultimate safety 
of the individual State can only be found in the Consti¬ 
tutional Confederacy. Historically, this doctrine was 
that of the Calhoun school of politicians, a doctrine 
which resulted very naturally in secession and disunion, 
that is in the total subversion of the Constitutional 
Confederacy. But there is at present no danger from 
this source, for it has been put down by arms, a neces¬ 
sary but most unfortunate occurrence, for war as above 
shown is a contradiction, it annihilates that which it is 
trying to preserve ; but most contradictory in a Consti¬ 
tutional Confederacy whose very object is to prevent 
war, the collisions of individual States. Through our 
civil conflict, therefore, the tendency now is toward 
union in its one-sidedness, toward centralization which 
destroys instead of preserving the individual State. In 
such case, likewise, the Constitutional Confederacy falls 
back into the empire with subject provinces instead of 
individual States. There is unity, but it is the unity of 
absolutism, of Orientalism, in whose capacious maw all 
free spontaneous life, all individuality is swallowed up. 
But the true, concrete union, the Constitutional Con¬ 
federacy exists simply in order to secure the individual 
existence of the State ; that is its whole content, that is 
the element which all States have in common, and 
hence is the point in which they all can be united. Such 
is the rational insight to be attained by every American 
into the nature of his government. Thus there can be 
no disunion, for that can only lead to the annihilation 



44 


The American State. 


of the individual State ; nor can there be any centraliza¬ 
tion, for that means the absorption of the individual 
State. As long as the American citizen remains true 
to this consciousness, the plague of the past can not 
return, and the plague of the present must vanish. But 
if he allows one State or one section of States, either to 
cut loose from the rest, or to absorb the rest, be it 
openly through violence or covertly through legal 
forms, the result is the same, the destruction of the 
Constitutional Confederacy. 


NO. 5. THE WORLD-HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT. 

Our attempt hitherto has been to give the logical 
basis of the State and the Constitutional Confederacy and 
to deduce them from the nature in human Will. We 
there adhere to the deduction of thought, to the logical 
evolution of these forms, without saying anything of 
the historical development. But this too must be con¬ 
sidered, for it presents emphatically the side of reality 
which cannot contradict, but must confirm thought. 
History itself is only a manifestation of Reason, and 
hence Reason cannot be in contradiction with history. 
It becomes necessary therefore to consult the records of 
nations, and see if we can discover the growth of the 
principle which was declared to be the foundation of 
the Constitutional Confederacy as well as of the Con¬ 
stitutional State. 

This principle was shown to be the recognition of 
the right of the individual State. This consciousness, 
namely, that every people recognizes the existence of 




The American State. 


45 


every other people as one with its own existence is that 
which calls forth and supports such a form of govern¬ 
ment, But such a consciousness is the ripest product 
of the world’s culture, it is the growth of centuries of 
strife and collision, it broadens the citizen from being 
merely national into being truly cosmopolitan, that is, 
his life becomes universal, the true destiny of man. 
But a mistake must here be avoided. Notice that this 
cosmopolitanism is of a peculiar kind, it is reached 
only through the State, in fact its very object, its whole 
content is the conservation and exaltation of the indi¬ 
vidual State. It must therefore be carefully distin¬ 
guished from that sentimental cosmopolitanism which 
professes to be above all mere State lines, and to disre¬ 
gard all national distinctions as too narrow for its com¬ 
prehensive soul. Such a spirit is hence negative to the 
State, and is even ready to see it destroyed, instead of 
cherishing and perfecting it as the most adequate and 
indeed the only means for the realization of the highest 
ends of humanity. For the State is the sole instru¬ 
ment of securing freedom to man, and the Constitu¬ 
tional Confederacy still further secures and completes 
that instrument. In fact this abstract cosmopolitanism 
is a contradiction in terms, its votaries would have to 
form a people without being a people, would have to 
be a nation without nationality. 

We shall, therefore, now address ourselves to the 
work of this part of our subject which is to exhibit the 
historical evolution of the principle of recognition and 
its coincidence with the logical evolution of thought. 
The Oriental States are simply based on the destruction 
of individuality through its entire sphere. But since 
this destruction is accomplished through the individual, 



4 6 


The American State. 


we must have the one exception to the universal rule, 
the despot, who tramples upon instead of recognizing 
all other individuals. Hence, there is in the East no 
such thing as Right in reality, that is, the real security 
of Will through law and institutions. A despot may 
be kind and dispense justice, but he may not; it depends 
wholly upon his caprice, there is no realized, system of 
justice. It may be said that all this is in accordance 
with the wants and consciousness of the people, that 
the Oriental State is the realization of the Will of the 
nation. Unquestionably these statements are true; 
this is just the oriental consciousness, to be a contra¬ 
diction ; for their Will is to destroy Will, and they 
realize their principle in their government. Hence 
Right is so uncertain, for it is eternally in strife with 
itself, that its own realization is its own destruction. Such 
is the case as regards the individual person, the same is 
true of the individual State. For each State of Orient 
cannot tolerate another State alongside of it, it must at¬ 
tempt to subsume all its neighbors. Hence the history 
of the East is a succession of empirrs, its heroes a 
succession of conquerors. All are seemingly impelled 
by one thought, that the existence of another nation 
besides themselves must be their annihilation. Their 
natural condition is hence war, which, as was attempted 
to be shown, means the destruction not only of the 
conquered, but also of the conquerors. It is manifest 
therefore that the Oriental world proceeds upon the prin¬ 
cipal of the destruction of the individual State instead 
of its recognition. Hence it is too that all Oriental 
States have passed away. Such is the general conscious¬ 
ness of the East, though I am aware, a few exceptional 
instances may be found by the historical student. 



The American State. 


47 


If the Oriental State rests upon the negation of the 
individual, Greece asserts directly the opposite. The 
fundamental principle of the political consciousness of 
the Greeks was what they called autonomy , the right of 
every State, nay, of every community and every village, 
to be governed by its own laws and to obey its own 
magistrates. Hence the political tendency of Greece 
was to split up into an indefinite number of petty in¬ 
dependent communities. Here we see individuality in 
its one-sidedness and self-destruction. For these indi¬ 
vidual States do not recognize one another, their chief 
object is to assert their own individual existence, hence 
the old conflict arises between the various struggling 
States. In such a struggle there can only be one result, 
one individual absorbs the rest, and thus the complete 
assertion of individuality in its abstraction lands in its 
opposite, Orientalism, the annihilation of the indivi¬ 
dual. Hence the logical as well as the historical end of 
the Greek world was Alexander and his Oriental despot¬ 
ism to which Greece was finally annexed. But it took 
several centuries to effect this result, which was the 
political death of the nation. There were various 
phases of the transition, wherein the Greek always 
sought to be true to individuality. The smaller States 
to prevent themselves from absorbtion, acknowledged a 
leader and protector. Thus arose the notion of head¬ 
ship or as they called it hegemony. But this union was 
not based upon recognition except to a small degree, 
hence these leaders always had the tendency to destroy 
the individuality of the States under them. The Con¬ 
federacy of Athens soon became the empire of Athens, 
from the leader she became the tyrant. Sparta under 
the banner of autonomy leagued the Greek States 



4 8 


"The American State . 


against the hegemony of Athens and destroyed it* 
Sparta was now leader, and in her turn commits the same 
acts which had overturned the headship of Athens. 
Thus it was shown that the Greek world could not solve 
this contradiction, and perished beneath its strife. The 
history of Greece exhibits little else but this collision 
between autonomy and hegemony, the two fundamental 
categories of its political consciousness. Alexander 
steps in, but he is a return to Orientalism. Still this 
is only apparent; not true, the world cannot go back¬ 
wards, hence Alexander’s empire disappears almost 
with him, and a new principle in the history of man¬ 
kind, the Roman, now arises and takes up into its bo¬ 
som the Hellenic nation. The undying merit of Greece 
is that she insisted on individuality, hence with her free¬ 
dom is born into the world. 

Rome too was a conqueror and hence in its birth it 
had the germ of its destruction. But it was different 
from the Eastern empires, for it sought to assimilate 
and not to annihilate the individual State. The Oriental 
cared not for his conquered people or lands, only they 
should not be. But Rome sought to make all coun¬ 
tries Roman, assimilation was its principle. It thus 
tried to universalize itself, not individuality as such, 
but itself, Rome. Herein it also differs from the Gre¬ 
cian States which sought their own independence merely, 
their own autonomy, not for all like Rome, but for 
themrelves. Provided they were free, why should the 
fate of their neighbors concern them ? These neighbors 
were perhaps barbarians or Greek enemies. It is true 
that this assimilation of Rome destroyed the individual 
State, yet it tried also to preserve it, in a manner, by 
making that State one with itself. Such was the grand 



The American State. 


49 


and mighty principle of Rome, it sought to make the 
world like itself, to make itself universal. But such a 
consciousness was also a contradiction, for Rome to be 
like all the world, must renounce its own individuality, 
must be no longer Rome. And this is just the process 
which took place, Rome is assimilated quite as much as 
she assimilates, all nations produce their influence upon 
her as well as she upon them. Not alone captive 
Greece captured her conqueror, as the Roman poet 
says, but all other conquered States assisted. The re¬ 
sult was, Rome changed, was no longer Rome, lost her 
individuality. Hence after a time she could no longer 
make conquests, her Roman strength was gone; thus 
ends the Roman Republic. The Roman world then 
attempted to hold itself together, to maintain its unity, 
which had been based upon the destruction of the indi¬ 
vidual State. Thus the empire arises when it has con¬ 
nected with itself the East, yet it is not the Oriental 
empire, but it rests upon Law, the existence and secur¬ 
ity of Will, which it was the special function of the 
Roman mind to establish for future ages. But still the 
emperor is above Law, hence Law is not yet universal, 
the Will is not yet secure. Thus the Roman Empire had 
the same contradiction which we find in Roman Law, it 
secured absolute caprice to the ruler, and at the same 
time absolute right to the subject. 

The ancient world had therefore in common the one 
principle, the destruction of individuality, yet in various 
gradations. Its whole effort was to remove the contra¬ 
diction inherent in Orientalism which we found to be, 
the Will realizing a form of government for its own 
destruction. The Greeks laid their whole stress upon 
the individual Will, hence with them Freedom enters 



5 ° 


The American State. 


the world, still not the full-grown man Freedom, but 
the infant Freedom. Hence the eternal interest which 
mankind has always had and must forever have in these 
first faint lispings, these infantile babblings of Freedom. 
But the Greek did not recognize the individual rights of 
his neighbor, he only asserted his own, and was indiff¬ 
erent to or assailed his neighbor’s. The Roman too 
asserts his own individuality like the Greek, but he 
seeks to make it universal like the Oriental. The Ro¬ 
man therefore to a certain extent united in himself the 
Greek and the Oriental. But none of them have come 
to the point of recognizing individual nationality, but 
all are based on its destruction. 

I am well aware that the historical student may point 
out many exceptions in the ancient world to the above- 
mentioned principles. But the general consciousness, 
the net result of ancient spirit is only intended to be 
expressed. To follow out the causes and results of all 
these exceptional cases belongs to the special history of 
antiquity. What is now wanted is to comprehend the 
essence of those times in a few sentences. For that 
was also a world of conflict and contradiction ; and 
necessarily must exhibit exceptions, instances hostile to 
its general spirit. Otherwise there could have been no 
war, no struggle. 

One of these exceptions I feel like mentioning, for it 
is so remarkable and so different from any civil organi¬ 
zation of its time that it almost seems a prophecy of 
the modern world, or perhaps of the United States, I 
mean the Achean League. Here we behold a confedera¬ 
tion of independent States with individual autonomy 
and at the same time subordination to the Confederacy. 
The great and striking characteristic and that which dis- 



The American State. 


5 * 


tinguishes it from every other political form of ancient 
Greece is that there was no hegemony, no State had the 
headship, it was the whole Confederacy which led. But 
it did not succeed, for such was not the true outcome 
of Grecian spirit. It seems the contrast to Orientalism 
into which Greece relapsed in the empire of Alexander, 
for this was its logical result. Yet as if to show the 
promised land, as if to give a momentary glimpse of 
the far-distant Future when not the individuality of 
Greece, but the true individuality based on recognition 
would appear among men, the Achean League sprang 
into a short-lived existence, a beautiful yet solitary 
flower growing out of the decaying trunk of the fallen 
oak. It therefore rather indicates the death of Grecian 
spirit, being so entirely different. If it could have won, 
if it could have beaten back the East on the one hand 
and |Rome on the other, mankind would, one seems 
compelled to think, have skipped two thousand years 
of its history and leaped at once into our own epoch. 
But the very fact of speedy dissolution shows that the 
Constitutional Confederacy could not belong to the an¬ 
cient world. 

But to resume. The ancient world brought no peace 
because it did not bring the recognition of the individ¬ 
ual. The Roman Empire as was above stated, could 
conquer no more, for it was not the old Roman spirit 
of the Republic. Hence the extra-Roman world be¬ 
gan to collide with it and finally destroyed it, chiefly 
through barbarians of the North. They broke the vast 
empire into fragments, each formed a nation of its own. 
Thus nationality was again restored after it had been 
quite destroyed by the assimilating process of Rome. 
This restoration of national individuality is the work 




The American State . 


5 2 


of the Middle Ages. They may be compared to 
Greece in some respects, for both have the principle of 
individuality in its one-sidedness, hence exhibit all the 
hatefulness and strife of selfish grasping individuals. 
But the Middle Ages have behind them the Roman 
World with its laws and the Gospel with its humanity. 

The Middle Ages therefore left Europe divided up 
into many different nations, each one having its own 
peculiar laws, customs, institutions and language. Now 
begins in more distinct outlines the struggle of individ¬ 
ual nationality against absorption. In the sixteenth 
century Charles V. roused Europe against him upon 
this issue. He seemed to aim at universal dominion, 
at swallowing up the smaller States into one grand em¬ 
pire. But the age of Rome was gone. These smaller 
States formed the League , which from this time forward 
becomes the most enduring and most powerful instru¬ 
mentality of European History. Now the League, as 
will be apparent on a slight analysis, is based on the 
recognition of nationality. For its members are re¬ 
solved to protect one another, to secure the individual 
existence of each constituent State. It is true that 
many princes may have had far different motives in 
joining such a league ; but he is a mere tyro in history 
who thinks that its great epochs and revolutions, its 
grand results are determined by the subjective motives 
of a ruler or minister. It is also true that the leagued 
nations had a very faint perception of their principle, 
and often fell out with one another, and lost for a while 
their basis of conduct. But neither Charles V. nor 
Philip II. were able to effect the subjugation of Europe, 
the League, weak and incomplete as it was, thwarted 
all their plans, and the sixteenth century witnessed the 



The American State. 


53 


secure establishment of what is called the Balance of 
Power, the purport of which is that the limits of every 
State, however small, are sacred, and must be guaran¬ 
teed by all the other States of a political system Still 
Europe has by no means secured the full fruition of 
this principle in all its results. The struggle is not yet 
ended, can not yet end, for it is based upon two hostile 
phases of consciousness, both of which are seeking to 
realize themselves. The Latin consciousness has re¬ 
ceived the inheritance of Rome, it speaks a modified 
Roman language, it judges by Roman law, and it still 
shares the Roman political thought, which seeks a unity 
resting upon the assimilation of nations and the des¬ 
truction of individuality. On the contrary, the Ger¬ 
manic consciousness, though it has sought the imperial 
bauble in Charlemagne and Otho, has been in general 
true to the principle of individuality in its broadest 
sense, the rights of the individual person and the indi¬ 
vidual State. Just as in the sixteenth century, Spain, a 
Latin country, sought to assimilate Europe to its own 
religious and political thought, so in the seventeenth 
century France also a Latin country made a like attempt 
under Louis XIV; an attempt which failed chiefly 
through the heroic efforts of the dwellers in a small strip 
of Germanic soil, Holland, a country which in the pre¬ 
ceding century had in defense of the same principle de¬ 
fied the mightiest ruler of the age, Philip II. The 
services of this country in behalf of nationality can 
never be forgotter for they are greater than those of 
any other country a Europe. 

Again after the lapse of a century, France renews the 
struggle, first in the Republic and then in the Empire. 
Napoleon represents the most intense phase of the Latin 



54 


The American State . 


consciousness, its culmination in modern times. The 
existence of an independent nation besides his own 
seemed to him not merely a contradiction, but a crime 
to be at once punished, and an insult to be at once 
avenged. That a people should dare to assert individu¬ 
ality, to make their own laws, to regulate their own 
affairs, to determine their own destiny appeared to him 
incomprehensible. I think that he was sincere, that 
such was his deepest principle of action. Assimilation 
was his watch-word. One of his famous sayings was, 
Europe must become French or Cossack. That is, 
one or the other, but one of them anyhow, all French 
or all Cossack. It may be fairly said that this sentence 
in one way exhibits the most portentous mistake on 
record. For it ignores not only the pYonounced ten¬ 
dencies of his own time, but the general movement of 
the World’s History. For that has always sought to 
preserve the individuality of nations, to mediate it with 
a supreme authority. Napoleon hence collided with 
this principle and went down, though he possessed the 
greatest military genius that the world ever saw, though 
he had the mightiest armies and the vastest resources 
that were ever brought together. His career shows that 
his thought is doomed, for it can never expect to have 
again such a powerful supporter. But he was a true, in¬ 
deed the truest representative of his nation. For France 
whether under republican or monarchical rule has always 
assailed nationality without, and individuality within. 
The consciousness is the same, and the only question 
seems to be, who shall carry it out, the rabble or the 
monarch. 

England was the champion of this revolution, and 
justly and necessarily so. She had achieved above all 




The American State. 


55 


other nations of Europe the rights of the individual 
person ; her whole internal history is one struggle toward 
this end. Having thus secured the greatest freedom to 
the individual citizen, she very naturally extends her 
principle, and broadens her field of action and becomes 
the champion of the individual nation when it is as¬ 
sailed. It is true that England was not always consist¬ 
ent, for she too flagrantly violated nations, but in her 
struggle with Napoleon, she gloriously vindicated the 
right of nationality. The Congress of Vienna caused 
a general restoration of all plunder, a return to the old 
limits of countries, in fine decreed national inviolability, 
which in spite of the exceptions has remained the funda¬ 
mental principle of European diplomacy. Besides treat¬ 
ies, alliances, and leagues, there has grown up another but 
very inadequate form of recognition, the so-called Inter¬ 
national Law. Though this Law is administered by the 
individual nation, and hence depends upon what may be 
termed national caprice, thus resembling in many respects 
a person who administers the law in his own case, and 
at other times resembling that self-constituted justice 
known in the West as Lynch Law, it is nevertheless 
based on a true principle, and attempts to vindicate and 
define the rights of the individual nation. 

Through the inadequacy of all these forms, treaties, 
alliances, leagues, and International Law, as well as ar¬ 
bitration, the individuality of the nation does not to-day 
feel itself secure in Evrope. It is afraid that some power¬ 
ful neighbor may assail it and hence the old distrust and 
danger remain that one individual State will swallow up 
the rest. Hence the standing army with all its danger¬ 
ous and oppressive accompaniments is organized in order 
to protect their individuality. But the standing army is 



56 


The American State. 


in every respect inadequate, for it may be beaten in the 
field on the one hand, and on the other it has a fearful 
tendency to destroy at home the very thing which it was 
intended to ultimately preserve, namely individuality. 
The rights of person are not, can not be esteemed 
very highly in a military government. The higher 
consciousness, therefore, is not yet ripened, the thought 
of the Constitutional Confederacy is not yet European. 
There is still the French and perhaps the entire Latin 
consciousness whose principle is the obliteration of na¬ 
tionality, assimilation, or in their own language, soli¬ 
darity of peoples. Nor is it by any means to be as¬ 
serted that the Germanic consciousness is ready for the 
Constitutional Confederacy. Have we not just seen 
the empire again arise on German soil, from which it 
has been so often driven back, the very home of indi¬ 
viduality. And it must be confessed that the problem 
of establishing the United States of Europe is far more 
difficult than was that of establishing the United States 
of America. Here there were different States, but the 
same nationality; but in Europe there are different 
nationalities to be united, with all their antipathies, 
variety of interests, and historical grudges, and at the 
same time a privileged class whose pre-eminence rests 
upon the suppression of personal and national individ¬ 
uality. 

But the true solution of the European problem is 
the Constitutional Confederacy. This, as was at¬ 
tempted to be shown before, signifies a confederation of 
States under a constitution whose entire substance and 
content is the security of the individuality of the States. 
Thus International Law becomes truly Law; thus the 
recognition of individuality is no longer subjective. 



The American State . 


57 


merely somebody’s notion, but it is real, an active in¬ 
stitution in the world and embodied in an instrument, 
the Constitution. Thus too the standing army be¬ 
comes impossible, for its only end and its only pretext, 
the security of nationality is realized and perfected by 
a wholly different means, the Constitutional Confed¬ 
eracy. Thus Peace enters the world through it*s only 
passage, through securing individuality to nations, for 
when the consciousness has arisen that every nation is 
secure not merely of its own individual existence, but 
also is determined to secure an individual existence, a 
free and untramelled activity to every other nation, 
how is war any longer possible, war which is the strug¬ 
gle of one State either to wholly absorb or to influence 
the destiny of other States ? Thus too fear and dis¬ 
trust must cease, for mark the nature of this consci¬ 
ousness ; how is it possible for Missouri to hate 
and distrust Illinois or Illinois Missouri if both are 
permeated with the thought of securing not merely*for 
themselves buCalso for their neighbors^ free unfettered 
state-existence, and moreover have realized that thought 
in a Constitution? To be sure such a Constitution 
without that consciousness is the most helpless of all 
sublunary things, but resting upon the same, it is the 
mightiest of all instrumentalities. 

Thus the Constitutional Confederacy is the noblest 
edifice yet reared by man to secure his will, his freedom. 
The whole tendency of history has been to bring it 
forth; in its infantile form it has now appeared in the 
world: it may be reasonably, added that the intelli¬ 
gence of man will yet perfect it in the course of history. 
The United States of America are still finite, not 
merely in their internal structure, but above all in the 
8 



58 


The American State . 


fact that they constitute a nation against other nations. 
Thus the Confederacy has its boundaries also against 
other nations and Confederacies, and hence the old 
struggle between hostile individualities may be resumed, 
this time between individnal confederacies. But it need 
not be said that thus they are untrue to their deepest 
principle, the absolute Recognition of the Individual. 
For it is equally a violation of that principle, whether 
the individual person, the individual State, or the indi¬ 
vidual Confederacy be assailed. The outcome however 
must be the same ; as we had a unity of nations brought 
forth by their mutual conflicts and wars, so we would 
now have a unity of confederacies. For upon this 
basis the most intense individualities must unite, the 
securing of individuality. Thus they all have a point 
of union, and their very intensity must only make that 
union stronger. The more determined they are to 
maintain their individual nationality, the more power¬ 
ful securities do they demand ; hence the combination 
into Constitutiooal Confederacy. Thus we see that the 
nature of true individuality is to be universal ; the 
mightiest contradiction of human spirit is solved; ab¬ 
solute difference is turned into absolute unity and har¬ 
mony. Unity by itself, as destroying individuality or 
individuality by itself as destroying unity are the most 
terrific mistakes of mankind which they can only atone 
for by the sacrifice of individual existence both of per¬ 
sons and nations. The true insight is for peoples to 
make their very distinction the principle of unity. 

How long it will take the world to realize this prin¬ 
ciple in its complete universality, is a question which it 
were wild to attempt to answer. The United States of 
America are already here; the United States of Europe 



The American State. 


59 


are in the thoughts of her intellects and in the aspira¬ 
tions of her people, and seem to be coming; and shall 
we refuse the seal of universality to our principle, and 
relegate to dream-land the United States of the World? 
It is true that before such a result can be attained, there 
is a vast ocean to be crossed, an ocean of time as well 
as of blood; but the truth of logic, the demand of 
thought, the aspiration of the heart and the faith of 
mankind all point to such a consummation. 


NO. 6-THE ENGLISH HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT. 

England was a province of the Roman Empire ; she 
was also like her southern sisters, overrun and held by 
the barbarians of the North and passed through very 
similar stages of development. But in the thirteenth 
century the heterogeneous population of her soil be¬ 
gins to coalesce, there arises a common language, com¬ 
mon institutions, England becomes a nation with a 
peculiar national principle. It is at this point that we 
may look for the origin of the English Constitution. 

This word is vague and contradictory, yet at the 
same time of very great significance to the English 
consciousness. Look into the books upon the subject. 
Mr. Hallam in his great work has nowhere defined it, 
and I think that a careful analysis of numerous pas¬ 
sages will show that he has confused and inconsistent 
notions about a constitution. Mr. Creasy says he will 
define it, but clearly does not. The reason is manifest, 
the English people have begun but not completed the 
realization of a constitution, they have not distinctly 






6o 


The American State. 


and logically organized its thought in a form of govern¬ 
ment, hence a complete definition can not be expected 
from them. 

To take an example. It is said that an act of Parlia¬ 
ment is omnipotent according to the Constitution, then 
the Constitution itself is simply the will of Parliament 
or rather of the House of Commons. Is there any¬ 
thing which it would be unconstitutional for Parliament 
to do ? Certainly not, if it be the highest. And yet 
the prerogatives of the King are said to be an es¬ 
sential part of the Constitution. The same is said of 
trial by jury ; could it then be abolished by Parliament ? 
There is evidently no safe-guard against such abolition, 
neither King nor judiciary could interfere. The Con¬ 
stitution evidently ought to be above parliament and 
prescribe its limitations; but it here affirms the omnipo¬ 
tence of parliament and thus specially denies its own 
restraining power. Still there is a settled feeling, not a 
distinct thought, that parliament must not contravene 
certain established principles, otherwise it acts uncon¬ 
stitutionally. These are stated by the writers upon 
English Constitutional law. 

The political history of England is the history of 
the curtailment of the prerogatives of the crown. The 
first of these struggles against the king was conducted 
by the barons, the result of which was the famous 
Magna Charta; the second was made by Parliament and 
resulted in the Bill of Rights and Revolution of 1688. 
It is not our present purpose to elaborate the princi¬ 
ples of these struggles in detail, though they are very 
necessary for a knowledge of our own government. It 
is sufficient to say that they have one general aim : to 
secure the will of the individual and the instrumen- 



The American State. 


61 


tality of the same. That instrumentality is the com¬ 
plete supremacy of Parliament which was attained in 
1688, since which time there has been no essential 
change in the English Constitution. How inadequate 
and contradictory this ultimate principle is, has just 
been shown, nor did it take long to manifest its inher¬ 
ent nature. 

England possesses distant colonies, and they can 
have no representation. But according to the English 
principle, Parliament is supreme, and the colonies must 
therefore become subject provinces paying taxes with¬ 
out being represented. It is at this point that the En¬ 
glish principle breaks down, Parliament contradicts 
itself as the great representative body of the tax-pay¬ 
ing citizens ; the contradiction inherent in the constitu¬ 
tional maxim of supreme parliamentary authority has 
now developed itself. The result is a conflict between 
England and her colonies,' each party supporting its own 
principle. Which party was right, is a question often 
asked. It can only mean, which party held to the more 
universal principle. England w^s compelled to declare, 
practically—representation for me, subjection for my 
colonies. But the latter answered, no, we must have 
universal representation ; when it is impossible, then 
we must have separation. 

The colonies did separate and began life with their 
new principle, which if it be carried out must also have 
new instrumentalities. The old Parliament of the 
mother-country will not do, it has proved its inade¬ 
quacy. Under the new principle there can be no de¬ 
pendencies, no provinces, no colonies in the ordinary 
sense of being subject to another country, all must be 
equal. England could not solve the prolem because she 



6i 


The American State. 


had not the thought of the Constitutional Confederacy 
which now appears as the next higher synthesis in the 
history of the world. 

The separation not only severed the Colonies from 
the mother-country, but also from one another. The 
.sole thread of unity being thus cut off, they are left as 
so many distinct and independent individualities. This 
is the condition in which the Declaration of Indepen¬ 
dence leaves the colonies which may henceforth be called 
States. Now shall we expect the old struggle of the 
Greek and Italian Republics to be renewed? Our 
fathers were afraid of it, and often gave expression to 
their fears. Fortunately the higher consciousness was 
fast ripening, namely, the recognition of the individual 
State. 

The first step is seen in the league as elaborated in 
the Articles of Confederation. But the league, as 
shown by history, is a very inadequate and transitory 
means for securing ^the nation. The result was that 
various States, after the external pressure of the war 
'with England had been removed, began to fall asunder, 
and even to assail one another. Then came the thought 
of America’s purest patriots and wisest statesmen, the 
formation of a Federal Constitution, which would se¬ 
cure to every State its own individuality throughout, 
which would not permit any State to destroy its own 
fundamental principle by destroying a neighboring 
State. Thus there is no need of a standing army, for 
its purpose is more adequately accomplished by other 
means. There can arise no war, for each State feels 
that in striking at a neighbor, it is only assailing itself. 
As long as this consciousness prevails, the jealousy, 
injustice, and turbulence of the republics of other ages. 








The American State. 




6 3 


can not be here renewed. But if it once be lost, we 
can only expect a return of these evils with ten-fold 
magnitude. 

Whence did our fathers get the thought of this Con¬ 
stitution ? Its origin is not difficult to be traced. Each 
State had a constitution of its own, with a complete 
organization of the three functions of government. 
They all had, therefore, the one common characteristic, 
in fact, they all had, essentially, the same constitution. 
The logical step now was to realize this common ele¬ 
ment in a new constitution, which, however, is only a 
reflection of all the rest. Thus union is secured in the 
one above the others, and the individual existence of 
the State is also secured, for the higher one is essen¬ 
tially the others. Such a form of government has been 
before named the Constitutional Confederacy. 

This short series of essays has attempted to state the 
logical basis of our institutions, and to give a cursory 
view of their historical development. They have been 
vindicated not after the legal fashion by precedent, but 
by thought. To be adequate, however, the outline here 
given should be filled up. iBtill, even as it is, the sub¬ 
ject has hardly more than been commenced. Now we 
should take in hand the Constitution itself, and exam¬ 
ine its provisions in the light of the foregoing princi¬ 
ples, in order to see wherein it is inadequate, inconsis¬ 
tent, and superfluous, as well as to behold and confirm for 
thought its excellences. That is, we are now ready for 
a critique of the Constitution. Such a work could 
have only one ultimate content: that the security of 
the individuality of the States is the true unity of the 
government. The interpretations of the Constitution 





LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 


0 027 119 793 7 


6 4 


The American State. 


can therefore be derived from and tested by its funda¬ 
mental principle. But this labor can not at present be 
undertaken. D. J. Snider. 


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